• Montana Complete Streets Toolkit
• Washington State Active Community Environment Toolkit
• Model Bike Parking Ordinance (with or without annotations) and Fact Sheet

Douglas County Promotes Movin' Afterschool Program

Douglas County Putting Prevention to Work urges its partners to vote for Movin' Afterschool as the promising policy program in the Childhood Obesity Challenge. Voting ends January 15, 2013 at 4:00 p.m. CST. Click here for details about how to vote. 

We Can! Launches PSA Campaign Children's Health

We Can!, in collaboration with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Ad Council, recently launched a multimedia public service announcement (PSA) campaign designed to encourage parents and caregivers to find creative ways to challenge their kids to make healthy choices. Read more about the campaign and view the videos.

Maternal and Child Health Library Releases New Resource

The Maternal and Child Health (MCH) Library at Georgetown University recently released a new resource: Overweight and Obesity in Children and Adolescents Knowledge Path, which directs readers to a selection of current, high-quality resources about the prevention, identification, management, and treatment of overweight and obesity in children and adolescents.

Rural Obesity Prevention Toolkit Released

The Rural Assistance Center recently released the Rural Obesity Prevention Toolkit, which contains eight modules that concentrate on different aspects of obesity prevention programs. Modules provide best practices developed by successful obesity prevention programs that have been implemented in clinical, school, and community settings.

The Role of Social Media in Fighting Childhood Obesity 
 The American Heart Association recently published a statement that addresses the impact of social media and social networks on childhood obesity and opportunities for using social media to combat the growing childhood obesity epidemic. Click here to read the statement.

Two New School Health Policy Guides Released

The National Association of State Boards of Education (NASBE) recently released two new chapters in its Fit, Healthy, and Ready to Learn series of school health policy guides. 

Food System Assessment Webinar Series Archives Available

The Gretchen Swanson Center for Nutrition, in partnership with the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Extension, the Douglas County Health Department, and the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services, Nutrition and Activity for Health Program, recently co-hosted a seven-part webinar series on food system assessment. Click the links below to access all seven webinars.

• Introduction to the Food System
• What We Know: Data of Food Systems
• Community Engagement
• Food System Assessment Tools: Primary Data Collection
• Nebraska's Nutrition Environment Measurement Survey (NEMS): Measuring Access to Healthy Foods in Retail Stores
• Using GIS to Visualize the Food System
• Results from a Nebraska Food System Assessment
   

Report Outlines Planning for Community-Based Food Systems

The American Planning Association published a new report that outlines the results of a three-year, multi-phased research study that identified and evaluated the food access and food system components of local government plans in the U.S. 

USDA Food Environment Atlas Updated

Highlights to the United States Department of Agriculture's Food Environment Atlas include new food access measures, 2012 farmers markets data, updated food insecurity measures, child food insecurity for 2003-2011, and SNAP stores and redemptions for 2011. A report on the updated estimates on distance to supermarkets from the Atlas is also available.

New Guide: Nutrition Education in Emergency Food Programs

WhyHunger has announced a comprehensive, 88-page capacity building guide, Cooking Up Community: Nutrition Education in Emergency Food Programs. This guide gathers resources and information about innovative nutrition education programming by organizations around the country. 

Health Impact Assessment Workshop Set for March

The Society of Practitioners of Health Impact Assessment's (SOPHIA) "HIA of the Americas" Workshop is scheduled for March 11-12, 2013 in Oakland, CA. The objectives of this two-day workshop are to provide a forum to network and to share resources and strategies that elevate the practice of HIA. The registration deadline is January 15, 2013. Click here for more information and to register.

Website Provides Physical Activity Resources

Active Living Research aims to support and share research on environmental and policy strategies that can promote daily physical activity for children and families across the United States. Its website has a special emphasis on research related to children in minority and under-served communities who are at highest risk for obesity. Click here to access the website.

Best Practices for City Planning Released in Report

A new guide from the League of American Bicyclists and the Alliance for Biking and Walking offers guidelines and best practices for Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs) to integrate active transportation into the transportation plans to ensure that bike/ped initiatives are integrated into the funding application process.

Transportation and Health Report Released

The American Public Health Association and the National Partnership have partnered to produce a new guide: Promoting Active Transportation: An Opportunity for Public Health. This primer is intended to give an introduction as to why and how health should be considered in transportation planning and decision-making--in particular through active transportation--and the role that public health practitioners can play.